There were plenty of
disbelievers when George Dimitrios began offering deep-fried
Mars bars at his Bondi Beach seafood shop. Now, he says,
people can't get enough of
them.

Mr. Dimitrios
said: We had banana fritters and pineapple fritters
but wanted something exotic, so we experimented
with deep frying different types of chocolate bars
and the Mars bar was the best.

Although shops on the central coast and in Victoria have
copied the idea, he said his Bondi Surf Seafoods was the
only outlet approved by Mars. Mars has given us full
support, he said. They did laboratory tests for bacteria
levels, then gave us the go-ahead.

The bars are dipped into
coconut batter, pre-cooked in a low-temperature oil then
deep fried. They cost $4.00, while an "unimproved" Mars bar
sells for $.

While customers were
sceptical at first, the novelty caught on and the shop now
sells up to about 50 a day.

So what does a battered and
fried Mars bar taste like ?. It tastes like a battered and
fried Mars bar.